WATCH: Investigating UK lobbyist influence on net zero policy
A new documentary focuses on a clandestine world of think tanks and their ability to sway politicians and woo media with little accountability.
Honing in on several organisations based around 55 Tufton Street, the film lays bare the role these organisations play in downplaying the climate crisis and calling into question net zero policy and targets.
Groups including Net Zero Watch, Institute for Economic Affairs, and Global Warming Policy Foundation have been successful in their attempts to derail a consensus on the need to mitigate and slow climate change through a reduction in carbon emissions. Having already been highly influential in the Brexit result, these right wing bodies have since turned their attention to environmental policy, slowing progress down and harming democratic process.
Carbon Conspiracy: How Shadowy Think-Tanks Went to War on Net Zero has been produced by The Good Law Project and premiered on YouTube on Thursday 27th June. While raising serious concerns about the nature of information being put out on social media and across news channels by these groups, the film’s main argument is that their funding sources – currently anonymous – should be publicly available.
By being able to hide where financial support is coming from, it’s argued that think tanks based around Tufton Street, just a few minutes from the heart of Westminster politics, could potentially be acting on behalf of big business interests, no matter the cost to the cost to people and the environment.
You can watch the documentary in full below:
More on net zero:
NHS Trusts don’t measure carbon, Scottish healthcare ‘green sites’ under microscope
Image: R4vi on Wikipedia